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Getting started with e-portfolios: University of Cumbria

UKCLE funded project

Project team: Sefton Bloxham, Fiona Boyle and Ann Thanaraj, University of Cumbria (e-mail: sefton.bloxham@cumbria.ac.uk)
Project summary: using e-portfolios to support personal development planning, career development and reflective learning
Completion date: October 2009
Funding: £1,000, with further support from the University of Cumbria’s Centre for the Development of Learning and Teaching


Project latest: paper presented at BILETA 2009 and Learning in Law Annual Conference 10 and published in JILT 2009 (3) – Using e-portfolios to support PDP and reflective learning within the law curriculum | slides from Learning in Law Annual Conference 10 embedded below

UKCLE awarded funding to the law school at the University of Cumbria for a pilot project aimed at embedding e-portfolios within the new degree programme to support personal development planning (PDP) and reflective learning. The project complemented the three mini-projects undertaken as part of UKCLE’s Using e-portfolios in legal education project.

The project aimed to:

  • develop expertise in personal tutoring to support PDP within the law programme
  • evaluate the student experience of e-portfolios
  • disseminate research findings, linked to institutional and national initiatives

The PDP programme is delivered through designated modules at each level of study. The team redesigned the PDP framework within a first year module (Legal skills and method) to accommodate the use of e-portfolios and held staff development sessions to explain the rationale of the project and give hands-on training with PebblePad, the chosen e-portfolio software.

Findings

Key issues which emerged from the project include:

  • staff development needs in respect of both IT and personal tutoring skills
  • IT challenges relating to the development of the e-portfolio templates
  • student access to the software and student ownership
  • assessment issues

Evaluation of the project was carried out through a series of questionnaires and focus groups, which identified that e-portfolios:

  • played a significant role in supporting and enhancing the process of reflection on learning
  • supported the development of students’ employability skills by providing a vehicle for reflection on work experience opportunities and CV writing
  • provided a vehicle for recording academic acheivements and skills development

Students indicated that further support was required in a number of areas:

  • more detailed guidance on the use of the different ‘assets’ in PebblePad
  • more structured diet of tasks for reflection
  • support from personal tutor could be variable

Last Modified: 4 June 2010